Tag: improvisation

At the tail end of November 2017, Gohan Tapes released ‘Spring’ — a new full length album from Joshua Saddler, who records as ioflow. On ‘Spring’, Josh combines field recordings, modular synthesis, and piano improvisations to capture memories like aural photographs. The sparse arrangements interplay with sounds of wildlife from the California landscape. This is an essential album, especially if you live somewhere that’s cold right now.

Much of his compositional technique is rooted in blind recording, a process he discovered through his participation in Marc Weidenbaum’s Disquiet Junto. If you’re unfamiliar, the Junto is an incredible project — a weekly assignment which challenges artists to explore new techniques and workflows. disquiet.com

‘Spring’ is additionally unique because it was made during the most physically painful phase of Josh’s struggles with congenital hearing loss and neural degradation.

Faith is important to him and it’s obvious that he shares his work as a celebration of life and in gratitude for his own.

This episode is structured a little differently. I’ve removed the interview elements and chosen to focus solely on Josh’s reflections. He’s underscored by selections from ‘Spring’, available on Bandcamp.

There’s something about Marcus Fischer’s music that fits this season. Last year, a lot of listeners shared how the snowstorms they were homebound by were the perfect backdrop to Marcus’s reflections. As another year closes, I am so excited to share another conversation with this wonderful artist. This isn’t something I expected, but Marcus has been really giving of his time and it was his suggestion to do a follow-up. In the spirit of the season, I’m very thankful to have gotten to know him better.

Since episode 5, Marcus has been (for lack of a much better word) busy. He completed the Rauschenberg Residency and released the follow-up to 2010’s ‘Monocoastal’ — ‘Loss’, which is absolutely stunning. He established an experimental power trio with Paul Dickow and William Selman called Wild Card, which toured with High Plains at the end of this past summer. He’s been performing with Lisa Schonberg’s Secret Drum Band. He recorded another collaboration with 12k’s Taylor Deupree called ‘Lowlands’. And I’m sure I’m missing something.

This episode digs beyond his output as an artist to explore the internal processes that inform his approach, especially as an improviser.

As always, the music from each of these projects and partnerships weaves throughout the episode, which can all be purchased as digital or characteristically breathtaking physical objects on Bandcamp.

My guest for this episode is Karl Fousek, an improviser who has spent the last five years crafting an incredible archive of live modular performances and studio albums. As a deeply devoted fan of experimental and electronic music and by dedicating himself to the mastery of his tools as a single instrument, Karl has developed a compositional agility which helps him explore new directions of form. His latest release, ‘Two Pieces For a Contemporary Connection’, is an inspiring hybrid of live improvisations and rehearsal recordings.

Beyond his work as a solo synthesist, Fousek also plays with Devon Hansen and Roger Tellier-Craig — a partnership which bore the very well-received ‘No Sound Without A Misunderstanding’ and most recently, ‘No Image In Particular’.

I’m so excited to share this episode. Through our conversation, Karl covers everything from his approaches to longform performances, building patches that are mutable yet structured, learning a modular system as an instrument, collaborating with others, and how he navigates uncanny sounds.

Marcus Fischer has been a staple figure in modern ambient and experimental music for the better part of the last decade. Characterized by his masterful use of tape loops, Fischer’s works also build space and emotion through layers of baritone guitar and modular synths. His solo debut, ‘Monocoastal’, was released on 12k in 2010 to international acclaim. Over the course of his career, he has partnered with several artists: Matt Jones (as Unrecognizable Now), Ted Laderas/The OO-Ray, Simon Scott, Devin Underwood. His collaborations with Taylor Deupree, with whom Fischer released ‘Twine’ in 2015, are masterclasses in shared voice and restraint.

Fischer is a longstanding member of lines, the online community that surrounds Eurorack module and instrument maker monome.

This episode explores glia’s ‘muqarnas’. Over the hour, Dan and Jonathan (glia’s offline name) discuss the impact the Persian language had on the album, improvising with electronics, creativity in prefab culture, and the depths to which instrumental artists encode themselves in their music.

Selections from ‘muqarnas’ provide framework, excepting the outro track, which is the previously unreleased ‘318(fesdup)’.